Jim Goodwin insists he doesn’t fear Hearts coming back up into the Premiership and making the race for the top six even tougher.
The Saints boss is adamant his club will continue to push for a top-half finish next season, despite the Jambos returning to the top flight after winning the Championship.
Their boss Robbie Neilson has already set a top six target on their return, but Goodwin believes his side are strong enough to deal with the challenge posed by the Tynecastle side after the Saints narrowly missed out on a top-half finish last season.
When asked if the battle for the top six would be more competitive next season, he told Express Sport: “It will be, definitely.
“It will be far more competitive again but that’s what we want. Nobody needs to tell me, the St Mirren supporters or any of our directors who the big clubs in Scotland are.
“For me, when you’re looking at a big club – you’re looking at their history over the years and you look at the size of the fanbase.
“We know we’re not in the same category at the moment as your Hibs, Hearts, Celtic, Rangers.
“But we are a similar level to St Johnstone. We’re a similar level to Motherwell.
“We don’t have to shy away from the fact that we want to break into that. I believe we can.
“I genuinely believe we can. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t. I’ve always tried to overachieve – I think I overachieved in my playing career.
"I think the fact I had the career I had despite the limited ability I had is quite incredible, and I’ll try to do the same as a manager.
“I don’t fear Hearts coming back up. It doesn’t interest me.
“I back myself against all of the other managers out there and I know if I can get the recruitment right in the summer and get the right five or six players in, I’ll back my squad against eight or nine of the other squads in the league.”
Despite the challenging financial climate last season, St Mirren’s two cup runs and seventh-place finish have bolstered the coffers heading into their next campaign.
Goodwin feels this will be crucial as they look to go one step further and seal a top-six finish come next May.
He said: “Sometimes you have to take a step back and think where the club was five years ago. We almost fell into League One and now we are heading in the right direction.
“We reached two semi-finals and missed out on the top six by a couple of goals. We’re building something here.
“Ultimately the more successful we are on the pitch, the better we’ll do commercially. The more season tickets we’ll sell, the more cup runs we’ll go on. We’ve brought in some good money from the cup runs that we didn’t budget for.
“During the pandemic, with the way things are going with revenue, those two cup runs could be hugely important to us when we look back in terms of balancing the books.
“We don’t have the biggest squad, we don’t have the biggest budget, we don’t have the biggest fanbase.
“But it doesn’t matter. It’s about how you do things around the place – how professionally run the club is, how organised we are, how hard-working we are on the training pitch. That will deem how successful we are on the pitch.
“We are an ambitious club and people maybe laughed and sniggered when those comments about finishing in the top six were made.
“But we have a great infrastructure here and I think we should continue to aim high.
“When the new season kicks off in July you won’t hear me saying I want to get enough points to stay in the league.
“That’s not me. I think that is a negative mindset.”
